


Nightmare

by OrionRedde, Shyrstyne



Series: Cometverse [78]
Category: Kingdom Hearts (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Dream Eater Riku (Kingdom Hearts), Multi, Nightmares
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-06
Updated: 2020-10-06
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:54:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,647
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26833252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OrionRedde/pseuds/OrionRedde, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shyrstyne/pseuds/Shyrstyne
Summary: Riku trying to help his partners with their nightmares has some unforseen consequences.
Relationships: Kairi/Riku/Sora (Kingdom Hearts)
Series: Cometverse [78]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1285373
Comments: 7
Kudos: 24





	Nightmare

**Author's Note:**

> riku is better at talking about his feelings than he used to be, but we all have our blind spots. while i was editting this it was _really_ obvious this was supposed to take place before sora's resolution, but even with the timeline Always Open in another tab i still mussed it up somehow. oops. i tried to clean that up as best i could, but ehhhhhh results may vary

Riku watches Sora and Kairi sleep soundly, feeling tiredness gnaw at his senses but knowing he can’t sleep himself just yet.

Or at least, not truly sleep, as he settles amidst them and feels their bodies curl up against him unconsciously. He takes only a moment to breathe them in, appreciate Kairi’s constant warmth and the cold of Sora’s feet, before letting his eyes drift closed.

And then he dives.

It’s easier to do it deliberately than it used to be, especially once Sora started therapy with Elise, but there’s still no shortage of nightmares here. Riku’s well practiced at dealing with them at this point, devouring them as efficiently as they can be before returning to his own dreams to deal with his own nightmares.

They’ve been getting more frequent of late. He’s talked about it with Elise himself, but as the dreams become more and more muddled it becomes more difficult to pinpoint their cause.

The only consistent feature in any of them are Sora and Kairi, but that’s normal. Most of his nightmares and dreams alike feature them in some way. Sometimes he wonders if it’s a Dream Eater thing, or if he still hasn’t truly gotten over the things he’s done.

Perhaps it’s both.

He’s tired, if he’s being honest. He hasn’t told Sora or Kairi what he does every night, he doesn’t want them to worry. It’s something only he can do, and for them he does it freely. He loves them, and he wants their sleep to go undisturbed. Especially Sora, who struggles to get to sleep at the best of times. He remembers seeing the rings under Sora’s eyes before, and he, still searching for Master Aqua himself, hadn’t been able to do anything about it.

He remembers pushing down the guilt. There hadn’t been time, then.

There’s time now, however, and so every night he dives a little deeper, rooting out the fears and anxiety and consuming them in the way only Dreams can. It’s dark here, and things hide in the shadows. Something drags across the back of him like cracked glass, a feeling that’s been growing stronger lately, and he can only assume it’s more Nightmares.

“I’m nothing!”

“You’re everything.” He says. He knows Sora, even this nightmare version, cannot hear him. Pink tipped claws slice at the walls, peeling the fear away like pulling the rind from a fruit. It sinks into his skin and he breathes it in like smoke.

He moves on. 

“Where? Where? Where?” An old one, recurring. Riku sighs, and holds the little heartless close, presses it’s rounded head into his chest.

“You’re not there anymore.” 

It keens, and Riku swallows it whole.

He dives. A bad night.

“Why aren’t I getting better?”

That makes Riku pause. This is the most accurate reflection of Sora he’s seen. He sits in an empty abyss, lit from some unseen source. Perhaps he himself is the source. He looks up at Riku.

“You are.” Riku says. Wings wrap themselves around them both, shading them from the light.

He hadn’t always had teeth and claws and wings when he dove, but the years had drug on, and every dive made him a little bit more tuned to his work. 

“I can’t.”

“You can.”

“I can’t think about it.”

Talking will get nowhere with this one. He dislikes the more accurate looking ones the most. He cups Sora’s face, tries to pull on the fabric of the dream, only to be thrown away.

“I’M NOT A CHILD!” It yells, screeches, wind blowing outward, ice biting at Riku in ways that isn’t normally possible in dreams.

Sora’s dreams always were an exception.

Blood drips down Sora’s cheeks like tears, tiny claw marks in his face where Riku’s talons had been ripped away.

“I CAN DO THIS.” It lunges at him.

Riku says nothing. He attempts to dodge but finds one wing caught in fingers that act more like claws, tearing painfully vertically down the swath. He winces in pain and wrenches free, tucking the torn wing close.

“YOU DON’T BELIEVE IN ME EITHER.”

“Of course I do.” He whispers, feeling something heavy in his chest. So many nightmares. He’s eaten too many tonight already.

The darkness sinks deeper into his bones, and between one blink and the next Sora has vanished.

He reaches out again, pressing a palm to the floor and willing it to dissipate. It refuses to budge, and if anything grows even more resistant to his attempts. His vision swims alarmingly.

“Why don’t you like who I am?”

“I _love_ who you are.” Riku wishes those words could fully encapsulate just how much he means to him.

Riku looks up, but the form he could have sworn had come to sit before him vanishes by the time he does. He goes from hands and knees to on his forearms, strength waning.

“I’m trying to help.”

He gathers his strength and gets to his feet. He cannot be stopped by some nightmare, Sora’s or no.

“Riku stop.”

“I’ll stop when he can sleep.”

He strikes.

-

Sora wakes with a jerk and the feeling that he’s just had the strangest dream, but before he can remember what it was, something thrashes against him and he finds himself too busy to think about it.

“Riku?” An arm lashes out and Sora catches it effortlessly despite his sleep addled state. It’s not the first time they’ve been woken by Riku having a nightmare, but when Riku all but howls into the quiet of their room, it seems more violent than most.

“Riku, it’s okay! It’s okay!” Kairi presses her hands against him, trying to soothe, but he only howls again, and this time Sora jerks back at what he sees.

“Where- Are those fangs?”

Kairi’s looking at him though, or more specifically, the hand Sora still has trapped in one of his own.

“Sora look- his fingers-” They’re going dark, only to lighten again into a near seering pink, hardening and sharpening even as Sora holds them.

Riku growls and abruptly curls up, clutching at his face in agony. Sora and Kairi both scramble to hold his arms away, too slow to stop the small scratches he leaves on his face but fast enough to prevent him from accidentally doing worse.

It’s only by luck Riku curls towards Kairi, baring his back to Sora, who sees the sigil of the dream eater across Riku’s back like it always is, barely visible against pale skin.

He sees it flare-

And change.

“Oh no.” Sora feels like he’s been gut punched as the Nightmare sigil stares back at him, darker and starker then the dream eater one, sitting almost innocently atop trembling muscles and skin.

“Sora?” Kairi asks, holding both Riku’s clawed hands now that Sora’s have gone slack. She sounds scared. Riku’s hair has gone from a soft white to a sickly gray, ears pointed at the tips. Purple seems to leak into his skin from somewhere they can’t see.

“I- I can fix this. I think.” Sora stutters. He doesn’t know that, actually. “Kairi, I need you to keep him from hurting himself or anyone else. I’ll be back.”

Her expression goes from frightened to grimly determined in an instant. He leans over to kiss her quickly and then wraps his arms around Riku’s shoulders from behind.

“Okay.” He says with a grounding breath.

And then he drops.

Even the dream worlds had never been quite like this. 

Sora’s never dropped into Riku’s dreams before; he’s never had to, and it doesn’t come as easy to him as it does his Dream Eater boyfriend. It would almost be an easy facet of him to forget if Sora didn’t see the sigil etched into Riku’s back like a delicate tattoo every night.

But somehow, he doesn’t think Riku’s dreams are normally like _this._

The dark is like tar almost, dripping from unseen walls, tugging at him even as he falls deliberately downwards. Fragments of memories and thoughts drift by him, but they’re warped, cracked. One’s he himself was present for exude a feeling he would never have associated with that scene.

Something is definitely wrong.

He lands before he’s really ready for it, stumbling awkwardly. He expected to see Riku’s heart station, but there’s nothing but darkness. In the center of.. Whatever this area was, is a large, deep purple cocoon, barely visible against the black backdrop.

He walks up to it, and places both hands against it’s bulk.

“Riku.” He says with a certainty that only comes with dreaming. “Riku, what’s wrong?”

There’s an awful shriek, and the cocoon cracks.

Sora jumps back as the shriek erupts again, gusts of wind and force tugging at his hair and clothes. A clawed hand grips the cracked edge forcefully, pushing it aside.

What emerges.. Isn’t Riku.

Silver hair turns pink at the ends, eyes glowing a sharp yellow, and skin mottled pink and purple, but that’s not the biggest difference. Wings jut from his back sharply, pointed and lethal, but not nearly as much as the claws that now adorn his hands and taloned feet. A long tail whips behind him, thrashing as he growls.

It’s Riku, and yet not.

It lunges at Sora, claws outstretched, and Sora rolls out of the way with all the quickness reflexes could afford him.

Between the wings rests the Nightmare sigil, sitting almost innocently across Riku’s shoulder blades. Sora feels something in his heart sink.

“Riku, it’s okay. We’ll fix this! I promise!”

-

If anything Riku thrashes harder when Sora slumps over into his dive, Kairi’s arms still loosely wrapped around Riku, and she holds tighter, hoping desperately Sora can find the problem quickly. She’d been training hard the past few years, to catch up to them, but Riku’s strength comes from that of a cornered animal, desperate and terrifying.

She doesn’t know what else to do, so she holds him and hopes, whispering sweet nothings to him in a desperate plea for him to hear her. He twists again, howling as she has to readjust to keep him from breaking away from her. 

His back arches, and something low and guttural erupts from his throat.

She swallows tears. ‘Later’ she tells herself. ‘Later.’

“Oh little dreamer, I _told_ you to be careful with what you were eating.” A voice comes from behind her and it takes all her self control not to whip around to face it. She can’t let go of Riku though, who’s claws continue to flex and grow sharper by the moment. She settles for attempting to look over her shoulder at the intruder, though she can’t get a very good look.

Thankfully Myde moves closer, shifting closer to her field of vision and settling across from her, just on the other side of Sora’s sleeping form.

“Myde? What’s happening?” She asks, a hint of desperation in her voice. If anyone would know, Myde would.”

“Sora’s gonna need some help with this one.” He says instead of answering her. The Abyss curls around him, eyes popping open on every corner of the ship’s bedroom. They reach out and wrap around Riku, trapping his thrashing form. Kairi still doesn’t want to let go, scared of what might happen if she does.

“What can I do?”

“Close your eyes.” Myde says. His own main eyes are closed, but she knows he sees fine. He sways from side to side as if listening to a song she can’t hear.

She closes her eyes.

“And _drop.”_

-

The fall is both terrifyingly fast and agonizingly slow. The walls circled around her nonsensically, dripping a darkness that sometimes gets too close, only to flinch away from the strength of her inner light.

She dodges around the bits of memory and feeling, scraping her hands across them as she goes. The black burns away under her touch, and the warping fades just slightly.

She keeps dropping. Faster. Faster.

She hears howling in the distance. It echoes and changes. She’s not sure if she’s hearing Riku, Sora, or somehow both.

She lands solidly on both feet with a crash, ducking into a roll as she lands mostly out of habit. She comes up with Keyblade in hand and face to face with a pair of wickedly sharp talons.

Riku doesn’t move, claws raised as if to strike, panting harshly. His face is contorted in animalistic fury, but something in his eyes flickers as he looks down at her.

She looks up (up, up, up, he’s always been taller, but it seems so much more now) with a solid determination. She hears Sora behind her, splayed on the ground from where he’d been thrown, struggling to rise once more.

“Tha’s..” The voice that comes from Riku’s throat is so faint and cracked it’s barely audible. “That’s not r’ght… You’re.. Not s’posed to be here… ‘s not your dream..”

“I’m here.” She says. “Riku you need to stop.”

She doesn’t release her stance, ready to move at a moments notice, but she lets her eyes and voice plead with him.

The claws still poised before her face tremble.

“No, no, I have to- I have to keep them-” The claws pull away as Riku draws in on himself. Kairi loosens her stance just slightly, and feels Sora’s hand on her elbow as he limps up next to her.

“Riku…” He says.

“You can stop now.” Kairi adds. “Please believe us.”

Riku tenses, and that’s the only warning they get before he lashes out again, bowling both of them over with a whip like tail. 

“I HAVE TO KEEP THEM SAFE.” He roars, and the battle begins in earnest.

Kairi recovers first, still fighting fresh, striking hard at incoming claws, launching blizzaga’s at his wings to keep him grounded. Sora darts around her, striking quickly as Riku lists dangerously from the extra weight on his back, snarling dangerously.

Riku manages to roll, smashing the ice on the ground and freeing himself, though his wings still twitch and shudder erratically. He won’t be flying away on them any time soon. Kairi starts summoning Pearl’s and Holy’s to launch at him, hoping to burn away the dark as Sora keeps him pinned with physical attacks. Meow Wow bounces through, throwing him, followed by a number of other Dream Eaters in succession, each taking a small piece of the miasma of Nightmare with them.

Meow Wow tries a second time, but Sora deliberately dispels them at that point. He doesn’t want to risk any more friends accidentally becoming Nightmares today.

It takes entirely too long for Riku to falter, and both Sora and Kairi stumble in surprise and exhaustion as Riku finally falls forward, colours warping and bleeding into the very air as he grunts and cries.

“I have to.. I have to….Keep them safe….” He pants, almost unable to finish, still holding himself on hands and knees unwilling to give in even after having been so thoroughly beaten.

Sora takes Kairi’s hand, and they walk forward.

Kairi kneels next to him, and Sora takes his other side.

“You did.” She says, and feels him tense under her.

“You did.” Sora agrees. “Let us protect _you_ for a bit, okay?”

“We’re okay. Let go.” Kairi presses her face into the hair at the nape of his neck.

Bit by bit, he relaxes. The colours continue to bleed and warp, dark purples and green-yellows giving way to pinks and soft golds. The wings, previously lethal weapons, curl around the three of them softly.

Finally, he sags in their grip entirely, like he can’t quite support himself any more.

“I’m sorry.. I’m sorry…” He mumbles, and it reminds them both of when they’d only just start sharing a bed in the gummi ship, half asleep apologies after waking from a nightmare he’d said he couldn’t recall. They hold him tighter.

“It’s okay.” Kairi says. “We’ll talk about it.”

“It’s… really you, isn’t it?” Riku asks, eyes closed and faced towards the ground, almost afraid to meet their gazes.

“Yeah.”

“We should wake up.” He says, despite sounding exhausted. Sora huffs.

“In a minute.” He says firmly, arms still wrapped tightly around Riku. “Just… In a minute.”

“... Okay.” Riku says, allowing himself to just be held for a bit.

-

When they stir once more in the waking world, Riku finds himself face to face with a very irate Myde.

“What did I tell you?”

“Uh..”

“Be! Careful! What! You! Eat!”

Riku gains a somewhat stunned look.

“I was just trying to help them sleep..”

“Which is fine, but you can’t take _every_ Nightmare or, well, _this_ happens.” Myde gestures dramatically, and it’s only then that Riku looks down and realises his fingers are still pink and clawed. Talons catch on thick blankets as he shifts, and he doesn’t have to look back to feel wings beat and tail swish.

“Are we still dreaming?” He asks, dazed. Myde huffs.

“You _wish._ No, you’re just the most stubborn Dream Eater on the face of the realms.” Myde thwaps Riku’s forehead with one finger. “Bad enough you almost Nightmare’d yourself, now you’re crossing realm barriers when you shouldn’t. Who do you think has to fix that?”

“.... You?” Sora hazards a guess. Myde throws his hands in the air.

“Me! I would get Glass or Bubbles to help me, but I haven’t had time to teach them and _you’re_ moving the schedule up several decades. Thanks for that.”

“Wait what does that mean?” Kairi asks, perplexed, but her question goes ignored.

“Lovesick Dreamers I swear.” Myde huffs again. “And that’s the other thing I said!”

“What?”

“Even black holes need to dream! Dreams are how people sort their subconscious! If he’s not dreaming he can’t finish healing!” Myde says fitfully, gesturing pointedly at Sora, who wilts.

“Oh.”

Riku looks like he might be sick.

“Sora I- that’s not what I meant, I was trying to help, I swear!” He near babbles. Sora shakes his head.

“No, I know. You wouldn’t.” He rubs his arm self consciously and Myde sighs.

“Right, the Nothing thing. Look, all of you.. It’s gonna be a rough few weeks for you, because _he-”_ he points at Riku, “overindulged and shouldn’t drop at all for a while until he’s not on the verge of Nightmare anymore.”

“Which means we’ll be having all the nightmare’s we should have been having before.” Kairi can extrapolate what that means well enough.

“I’ll try to help, because it is gonna be bad, I won’t lie. I’m no Eater. I can just give breaks sometimes. That being said, I can tell you three have some talking to do, so I’m gonna bail.”

“Wait!” Riku calls as he turns. “What about, uh..” He gestures at himself, wings flaring for emphasis.

“Oh yeah. You’re gonna be on the edge of the dream for a while too. Might find yourself falling asleep in strange places sometimes, so try not to go anywhere alone until they fade.”

“They’re gonna go away?” Sora asks as he reaches one hand up, petting a wing gently. Riku tries desperately not to shudder at the too real touch.

“Sorta? I won’t lie, you’ve broken some weird barriers really early this time. Could probably do like.. A summon thing with them? But not soon! Let them fade first!” He emphasises, and Riku nods.

“Got it.”

“Ciao.” Myde waves, and then vanishes, the hold grows a little lighter, and all the eyes along the walls close and disappear.

Riku sighs, and then flops backwards in bed, covering his eyes with one arm.

“I’m so sorr-”

“Don’t even start.” Kairi says firmly, making Riku pause and lift his arm just slightly to look at her. “You were trying to help, and it’s not like any of this came with a guidebook.”

“She’s right. We know better now, and we can work with it.” Sora adds with a nod before laying down next to him, petting the splayed wings once more. “Honestly, I kinda like ‘em.”

“They are very pretty.” Kairi agrees with a giggle. “Were you tired of trying to keep up with us as were’s? Is that what this is about?”

That prompts a laugh from Riku. It’s an old jealousy now, being the only human amongst them had only been yet another factor in his teenage need to be better than them at everything. It was something he’d long since come to terms with, and could laugh about now. “There’s no such thing as bat were’s though.” Sora says. “Just cats and dogs… And bears, I guess. So I think you missed the mark there.”

Riku reaches over to noogie Sora playfully, heart bursting with love at their easy forgiveness.

“Riku, your eyes-” Kairi gasps, and Sora blinks up.

“They’re yellow.”

For a moment, just a moment, Sora feels old fears stir inside him, until he sees the way Riku immediately starts to withdraw, and has a different idea.

He pulls him in for a kiss.

He means it to just a quick peck, but ends up drawing it out as they both sink into it, the stress of the night leaking off them as they take comfort in the small gesture. When he pulls back, he smiles.

“I knew it.” 

“Knew what- oh!” Kairi leans in to see, leaning closer to inspect his face as she sees what Sora did.

“What? What?” Riku pouts, disliking being left out of the loop. Sora just grins.

“Your eyes are pink now.”

Riku can feel the tips of his ears burning.

“You really are a dream eater huh.” Kairi giggles. Riku shrugs, giving massive wings a light flap.

“What, these didn’t tip you off?”

“So, bat huh.” Sora hums. “And yellow eyes means.. Wingman? Really, Riku?”

“I was- I was trying to help!” Riku protests. Sora giggles, throwing his arms around Riku once more, followed quickly by Kairi.

“We love you too.”

**Author's Note:**

> this was one of those 'we set this up for funsies to play with in a future subplot' and then uh. we burnt ourselves out and the series ended. so. riku gets monster'd Just Because I Guess. 
> 
> we've got one more mini-arc with vanitas left (roughly three chapters), and then a soft end for cometverse as a whole and then.. that's it. god it's gonna be rough to call this series done tbh


End file.
